November 25, 2008

109-customer charity chain at Starbucks

by ssavage

Starbucks workers in Sacramento said a woman who paid for someone else's drink sparked a chain of 109 like-minded purchases.

Employees of the Starbucks in the 1000 block of Exposition Boulevard said the woman's charitable gesture in the drive-through line Monday incited the next 108 customers in the line to follow suit and pay for the beverages of the motorists behind them, KCRA-TV, Sacramento, reported Tuesday.

The workers said the pay-it-forward style of coffee charity is not uncommon for Starbucks cafes, but the Monday's chain of 109 purchases in a row may qualify as a Guinness World Record.

We usually get up to 50 or 60 (pay-it-forwards), but 109, we're thinking that it's a record, Starbucks employee April Fredrikson said. We still recognize that we're all kind of in it together, we're all in the economy thing together and to come here and just like pay it forward and help everyone out, it's really a community contribution.